A Look at League of Legends

Some of you may remember Malgayne's twoblogs a while back about the upcoming game League of Legends. Well, LoL has been out for a while now, and I have had a chance to test out the game, so I thought I would share my experience with you!

Those of you who aren't interested in anything but WoW have my permission to stop reading now. :)

Summary

League of Legends is designed by the same people that created the game DotA (Defense of the Ancients), a custom map for Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne. League of Legends is basically the same as DotA except new and improved. In it, there are two bases on either side of the map and there are two teams. The blue team starts in the bottom left of the map and the purple team spawns in the top right.

Each team consists of five people. Each person is a "summoner" that summons one of 43 different champions to fight for them. The player controls the champion as their "unit" for the match. Each champion has seven different spells. One passive, four active that you level up, and two summoner spells. When the game begins, players will head down the different lanes. There are three lanes as shown in the map. The usual strategy is for two people to go down the top lane, two people to down the bottom lane, and one person to solo the middle.

Spaced evenly among the lanes are towers. Each team has eleven towers. Two in each lane, one guarding each of the three inhibitors (I'll talk about these later), and two guarding the nexus, aka your base.

The Object of the Game

Simply put, the object of the game is to defeat the enemy champions, destroy the other team's towers guarding the lanes, push into the base, and destroy their nexus; all the while protecting your base from the other team doing the same thing to you! And never forget that there are waves of NPC's on both your team as well as the enemy team! Trust me, it's not as easy as it sounds.

NPCs

Every thirty seconds, waves of minions consisting of melee, range, siege rider, and super minions (If you've destroyed the inhibitor, don't worry, I'm getting there!) will spawn from your nexus and travel down each of the three lanes attacking anything that they meet, whether it be enemy minions, enemy champions, or enemy towers.

Other than the NPC's on your team, there are also NPC's spread across the map. Some of these NPC's are merely for earning gold and experience, but some of these minions carry a powerful buff that transfers to the unit that slays them. Listed below are a few of the NPC's found on the map.

Baron Nashor - This worm is the most powerful unit on the map. Including champions. The only way to take down this bad boy is with your whole team. And don't just think that if you have your whole team with you you can kill him, oh no. You've got to be a high level as well! However, if you manage to kill the Baron and survive you will gain such things as instant 900 experience points; 200 gold; and a buff that gives you +40 ability power, +40 damage, +3% increase in health regeneration, and +15 increase in mana regeneration! Defeating the Baron can literally turn the tide of the battle in your team's favour.

Dragon - This beastie is the second hardest NPC on the map, and while not as tough as Baron Nashor, he doesn't give as good rewards either. Unlike the Baron, the Dragon can be solo'd, provided that you are a high enough level. On death, your team will gain global experience and gold.

Lizard Elder and Ancient Golem - These two NPC's tie for third place in level of toughness. However, they are some of the most sought after. Upon killing these units you will gain a special buff that will help your champion in battle.

The Nexus and the Inhibitor

If you manage to make it down one of the three lanes, past the two turrets, through the waves of minions, and beyond the enemy champions, then the game will almost be complete. However, before it is, you must destroy the inhibitors and then the nexus.

The Inhibitor - There is one of these structures located at the end of each lane, just inside the enemy base and guarded by a turret. If you destroy the turret and then eliminate the inhibitor, your base will start spawning super minions. Note however that the super minions only spawn on the lane that corresponds with the destroyed inhibitor. If you wish to spawn super minions on all three lanes, then you must destroy all three inhibitors.

The Nexus - If you have gotten past the inhibitors then there is only one thing stopping you from winning the match. The nexus and its guardian turrets. The nexus is located in the center of the bases and is guarded by two turrets. You must first eliminate the turrets before attacking the Nexus. However, if you have come so far as to destroy the two turrets guarding the nexus, then fear not! The game is basically over and your opponents know it!

The Shop

Your champion will earn gold pieces from getting the last hit in on a minion or NPC of any type. This gold can then be spent on the shop next to your "summoning circle" (the place where champions spawn). The shop sells items that can help your champion in the course of battle. Such items are potions to heal you, items to increase attack speed, critical strike, armour, mana regeneration, etc.

Successful Completion of a Match

If you beat the match, then you will receive experience for your summoner and IP. The experience levels up your summoner, allowing you to gain talent points to spend and give bonuses to your summoned champions and unlock better summoner spells. IP, aka Influence Points, are gained each match you play. Of course, you gain the most for being the winning team, but the losing team also has a small consolation prize. These IP points can then be spent in the Riot Store to unlock champions to summon.

Champions

There are currently forty-three different champions to unlock. These champions range from such functions as a tank, a rogue, a mage, etc. and from such different types as a ninja, a pirate, a yeti, an alien dinosaur, etc. The highest level a champion can become is level 18. As mentioned earlier, each champion has one "passive" spell that they start out with and four "active" spells that they can level up in addition to their two summoner spells. Riot (the game creators) make new champions available for free every week. At the end of the week, these "free" champions will be switched out with a new group. So in other words, you can play as Fiddlesticks (a warlock-esque scarecrow) for a week because he is a "free champion" for that week, but at the end of the week you won't be able to play him anymore unless you purchase him with your earned IP or he is made available for free again.

My Thoughts on the Game

I think the game is an excellent one. It's quick and fast paced. The shortest game I ever played was about 15 minutes long, and the longest and hardest one I ever played was about an hour long. As long as you aren't looking for an immersive storyline or world, but are merely looking for great fun and excellent multiplayer combat, then this game is probably for you. Since there are forty-three different champions, many different items, lots of spells, and different talent tree combination's, the PvP is always refreshing and new. I'd say that the primary problem with the game is that it has a steep learning curve and most of the players are not understanding towards newbs. My suggestion - your first few games will probably suck, and you might get yelled at a bit, but if you stick with it until you get the hang of it, I think you'll be glad you did so.

So now that you've learned a bit about the game, why don't you go give it a try and come back and tell us what you think?

Comments

Comment by dartkun

on 2010-01-15T19:21:21-06:00

LoL is amazing, people should definitely check it out, I'm a level 30 summoner, working hard to perfect my 5s team for the tourney that is coming soon(tm).

My only warning is, make sure that you don't rage quit before you even give it a chance. There's a tough learning curve, but not as harsh as DotA. Just work hard, I got owned at first, and now... Yes this is a normal game. :P

Comment by Eluneril

Is all you will hear for your first zillion games, until you manage to master it.

Comment by Queggy

on 2010-01-15T22:03:02-06:00

Yeah, the community is not forgiving of newbs...

''STOP FEEDING THEM IDIOT''

With stronger language of course. :P

But trust us, if you stick with it, you'll learn and come to love it!

Comment by Hyperspacerebel

on 2010-01-15T22:25:07-06:00

Yeah, the community is not forgiving of newbs...

''STOP FEEDING THEM IDIOT''

With stronger language of course. :P

But trust us, if you stick with it, you'll learn and come to love it!

I played the beta (I think it was beta, otherwise it was the day it came out) and I got that every day for a week.

Comment by Domminion

on 2010-01-16T00:50:55-06:00

I don't like DoTA much, but I'll give this as good of a try as I did with DoTA. (I only played like 10 games max, then decided that there were better games I could be doing)

Edit: hm, I can't get onto the site. Anyone else having trouble?

Comment by Fandalf

on 2010-01-16T02:46:02-06:00

meh overrated QQ on forgivnes on newbi

people not like to forgive since if you die 10 times in row on less then 20 min you doing something terrible wrong + you kind of sold the game to the enemy;)

try practice matches first and plenty og guides on forum....did start just a week ago (need a break from wow) and I only lvl 13 but i sucked few first games but now I easy in the "K>D ratio" place

if you understand the concept of how it works early,mid and late game....it will make you survive much longer...and kamikaze is bad if you won't kill them

if you want to talk REAL QQ....join a Dota public match...you will get so flamed that you computer catch fire

If people want to try and have some problem....we can always make "Wowhead practice " matches if people want to try it out but not want the flamewars (add "stickmana" and catch me ingame and I will try to help you out)

Comment by skuul303

on 2010-01-16T04:24:08-06:00

Sign up site is down :[ Guess I'll wait untill HoN comes out of closed beta then -.-

Comment by Aldun

on 2010-01-16T04:34:09-06:00

Using your wowhead blog "power" to get refs for the rewards is quite weak tbh.. You should give the people the choice to use the normal link or your ref.

Comment by Zephyrith

on 2010-01-16T05:45:18-06:00

I am not a fun of DotA, but if I would have to pick between HoN (Heroes of Newerth) or LoL it would be HoN. I've also heard that you can't deny in lol, which destroys half of the part of creeping.

However, I highly dislike the dota community and I think that there are way better competetive games out there.

Comment by Fandalf

on 2010-01-16T06:00:03-06:00

I am not a fun of DotA, but if I would have to pick between HoN (Heroes of Newerth) or LoL it would be HoN. I've also heard that you can't deny in lol, which destroys half of the part of creeping.

However, I highly dislike the dota community and I think that there are way better competetive games out there.

sadly its true that you can deni , but its more focused to deny with just kill the hero;)

Comment by Queggy

on 2010-01-16T08:07:53-06:00

Using your wowhead blog "power" to get refs for the rewards is quite weak tbh.. You should give the people the choice to use the normal link or your ref.

In my favour, I started writing this blog before they released the refer-a-friend . . . I didn't write it just for that!

Like I said, I decided to write this blog about a week before they released the RAF. However, once they did, I decided to stick it in there. I mean, why not? It's not different in any way from the other.

Also, if anyone wants to add me as a friend so we can play together, my nick on there is Queggy as well.

Comment by Hyperspacerebel

on 2010-01-16T10:58:30-06:00

Also, if anyone wants to add me as a friend so we can play together, my nick on there is Queggy as well.

Will you call me a noob? QQ

Heh.

Comment by mrfoughtforever

on 2010-01-16T11:21:21-06:00

Sign up site is down :[ Guess I'll wait untill HoN comes out of closed beta then -.-

Open Beta for HoN started in Dec.

Comment by Zephyrith

on 2010-01-16T11:26:35-06:00

Sign up site is down :

Yeah, lol.I've got about 5 accounts.

Comment by Domminion

on 2010-01-16T11:42:41-06:00

Well, now I can get onto the site, but man the download is taking forever...

edit=spelling

Comment by Miracul

on 2010-01-16T11:54:43-06:00

if you want to talk REAL QQ....join a Dota public match...you will get so flamed that you computer catch fire

this made my day:)

btw. I haven't played this yet... is it a lot better then DotA or kinda the same with just better graphic?